Safer streets thanks to city Red Routes

Two years since the introduction of Red Routes in two of the city’s busiest areas, there’s been a sharp fall in the number of people being injured on the roads.

Red Routes, which allow us to enforce existing parking restrictions with CCTV cameras, were introduced in Preston Road/London Road and Lewes Road in April 2024 in response to complaints about anti-social parking causing congestion and safety concerns.

Since then, there’s been a marked reduction in the number of people being injured.

The figures show there was a 39% fall in slight and serious injuries across the three areas in first year after Red Routes were introduced, compared with the year before.

So far in year 2, there’s been a 48% reduction comparing it to the same period.

Additionally, last March Brighton & Hove Buses, the city’s largest bus operator also reported an 85.7% reduction in passenger injury incidents in those areas

Monitoring sensors also recorded a reduction in Nitrogen Dioxide levels in the 6 months after the scheme was introduced. This reduction continued in 2025.

Keeping residents safe and our city moving

Councillor Trevor Muten, Cabinet member for Transport and City Infrastructure, said: “It’s great to see the positive impact the Red Routes are having.

“Anti-social parking and stopping was a big problem on these roads, making them dangerous and causing congestion for other road users.

“We’ve had very positive feedback on the impact of the Red Routes, the data shows they’re a lot safer and we’ve also seen marked improvements in the air quality on these routes.

Footfall information

The change in London Road has also been accompanied by an increase in footfall.

There were more than 100,000 extra movements of people on the road in the 12 months after the Red Route was installed, 4.78 million from May 2023 to April 2024 compared to 4.89 million from May 2024 to April 2025.

Councillor Muten continued: “We know one of the concerns from businesses about Red Routes is that it will discourage shoppers. But our data clearly shows there’s been no impact on the number of people using London Road which is great news.”